


Petty Existential Crisis

by clockwork_spider



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Abusive Behavior, Angst, Introspection, M/M, Melodrama, past-relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-13
Updated: 2016-07-13
Packaged: 2018-07-23 16:52:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7471653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clockwork_spider/pseuds/clockwork_spider
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Byakuran exists as a singular entity across the span of multiple universes, and Shouichi is but a facet of himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Petty Existential Crisis

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WreckageofShips](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WreckageofShips/gifts).



“Do you remember,” he asked, face half-turned towards the window, “of when we first met?”

It was a stormy evening, and the two of them were waiting the storm out at Byakuran’s apartment. The air was heavy with the smell of ozone.

“We were stuck in the storm together,” he laughed, his fingers dragging vertical lines down the condensation-frosted window, “in the bus shelter, you were soaked, and you complained that there weren’t windshield wipers for your glasses.”

It was a trip down the nostalgia road, which was always dangerous and awkward, more so if said event never happened, not in this universe.

“Byakuran-kun,” Shouichi reminded awkwardly, “that wasn’t us. We haven’t gone to university together.”

“But you do remember, surely?” Byakuran’s voice was high and lilting, his smile was dangerous, a razor’s edge.

And Shouichi did. But to remember and to accept were different.

“We have memories of things we’ve never chosen to do.” Shouichi tsked, Byakuran’s smile made him nervous. It was too familiar. “That’s a bit fucked up, don’t you think?”

To accept their university days would mean to accept everything that came afterwards. It would mean to accept the monster his so-called friend became, and to accept the blood on his hand. That would be too much burden to bear. Shouichi had no room for it.

“I know you’d rather pretend that the future never happened, but why deny what we both know to be true?” Byakuran swirled around in a breeze of feathers, his eyes wide and his smile vacant. Long fingers clamped themselves around Shouichi’s shoulders.

“You see, Shouichi, we’re a product of our experience. That is what make us _us_!” And Shouichi found himself being drawn closer to the monster before him, to his old friend. The lavender eyes were bright with lightning.

“Remember that time where I was stuck in your room?”

Shouichi remembered, he remembered the smell of rain, like this day, and the haze of alcohol.

“Byakuran…”

“Remember how you said it didn’t matter if the world ended, that there was no god greater than ourselves?”

“Byakuran, stop, you’re scaring me.”

“Shou-chan,” he was so close, too close to face. His voice rang beside Shouichi’s ear. His vicelike grip tightened all the more.

“Remember this?” Byakuran’s lips ghosted across his own. He remembered the warmth of Byakuran’s breath, he remembered the taste of marshmallow and alcohol, tinged with nervousness and anticipation.

“ ** _Don’t you remember?_** ” Byakuran’s voice was drowned out by the thunder, but the grip was hard enough to bruise.

He remembered electricity running through his skin when they brushed against each other. He remembered Byakuran’s hand against the back of his neck. He remembered the smell of lavender.

He remembered the feeling of regret.

“Byakuran, take your fucking hands off me,” Shouichi growled, staring the monster right in the eyes.

The air hung as the rain pattered on.

“Shou-chan.”

The grip loosened, gravity took its course and Shouichi staggered as he widened their distance, his back hitting the cold marble counter.

“I’m sorry.” Byakuran’s expression was eerily serene. The man in front of Shouichi was not the carefree youth Shouichi have gotten to know in the past few months.

“Byakuran,” Shouichi breathed, steadying himself, “calm down, you’re not being yourself.”

“Myself?” A laugh, bitter. “I’ve never been anything but myself, Shou-chan. I have always been me… they were all me. Past, future, every parallel world.”

“I’m Byakuran, the man who destroyed worlds, and you’re Shou-chan, the one who stopped me. Surely, you must remember. It’s who you are.” There was a certainty to his voice, a conviction.

And that, Shouichi realized, was yet another difference between them. Byakuran was a singular entity across the span of the multiverse, and Shouichi was but a fragment of a whole.

Time stilled. The pitter-pattering of rain softened. The storm outside begun to clear.

And Shouichi would never be the entire multitude of Shouichi that Byakuran knew, and that he’d rather live his life linearly, as a fragment of himself.

“I’m sorry, Byakuran,” he said, gently, but firmly, “I’m not… your Shouichi.”

“And I could never…” he paused, and corrected himself, “I don’t wish to be the Shou-chan that you knew.”

“But I’m… I’m right here,” Shouichi swallowed, and gingerly closed the distance between the two of them once again. His hands shook and his shoulder muscles screamed as he reached, towards the monster in his dreams, towards his old friend, towards the boy he’s just met a few months ago.

“You’re right here,” his heart stilled as the boy leaned in, as his arms found themselves around the thin shoulders. The heat of Byakuran’s body melting his skin as their heart met and beat against each other.

Byakuran laughed, a note too high to be bitter. “But Shou-chan have always been the same.”

**Author's Note:**

> The melodrama is thick in this one. I used metaphors.


End file.
